


Pumpkin Spice (and all things nice)

by IndianSummer13



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Halloween, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-21
Updated: 2018-10-21
Packaged: 2019-08-05 08:37:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16364540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IndianSummer13/pseuds/IndianSummer13
Summary: Jughead grins at everyone, baring his plastic fangs which are beginning to cut into his gums a little, and announces, “I’m a vampire.”Everyone turns to look but then Chuck says, “That’s Archie’s last year’s costume,” and proceeds to fire his plastic gun at Jughead’s head.He’s immediately disappointed and takes the fangs from his mouth.“I think you look scarier than Archie did,” Betty whispers to him when Mr and Mrs Andrews leave the room, and he’s surprised at how quickly he feels better..Or, Jughead, Betty, and Halloween through the years





	Pumpkin Spice (and all things nice)

“What are you meant to be?” Archie asks. He’s wearing a black cape and a white shirt with black pants - has shiny black shoes too - and his mom has painted his face white with red dripping from around his lips, and he blinks in confusion at the old (not quite) white bedsheet thrown over Jughead.

“I’m a ghost.”

“You don’t look like a ghost,” Archie decides aloud.

Betty, dressed, Jughead thinks, as Little Bow Peep, disagrees. “I like your costume Juggie,” she says. “The eyes look scary.”

It’s probably because he cut them out himself with the sole pair of scissors he could find in the trailer which, incidentally, came from Jellybean’s craft box that she’s not quite old enough to use. They hadn’t been as sharp as he’d anticipated and so rather than being able to cut the material, he’d sort-of had to hack at it until the slits were big enough for him to see.

“Thanks,” he tells her. “I like your costume too.”

Betty giggles because he’s a boy and boys aren’t supposed to like dresses, but the comment seems to make her proud all the same. She taps her crook on the ground and smiles a little wider and says, “Thank you.”

They’re joined a few moments later by Reggie Mantle and Chuck Clayton who are both something sports-related. Mr Andrews asks if they’re all ready and Mrs Andrews checks if anyone wants another hot dog before they head out trick-or-treating, and Jughead hopes nobody thinks he’s greedy when he says “Yes please,” even though he’s already had two - _ and  _ a baked potato.  

When he takes a bite, the dog slips out of the end and in trying to save it, he gets ketchup on the sheet, momentarily horrified until Betty tells him they can pretend it’s blood. 

It turns out that residents on the North Side of Riverdale are more generous with their candy than those on the South Side, and Jughead’s bucket (borrowed from Archie) is full before they’re even halfway along their route. In a spot of quick-thinking, he presses down the candy so there’s more space at the top of the bucket, and is pretty satisfied with his efforts until suddenly, the handle snaps and some of the candy (good stuff, too!) spills onto the sidewalk. 

Archie is ahead of him - racing Reggie and Chuck in a bid to be the person to ring the doorbell of the next house - and Mr Andrews is occupied with calling for them to wait until everyone is there to notice the accident. Betty sees though, and sympathetically says,

“Don’t worry - I bet Mr Andrews will fix it. He helped me with my bike last week.”

Jughead nods but feels bad anyway (more so about the lost candy than the bucket) until Betty adds,

“You can have some of mine. My mom never lets me eat all of it anyway.”

Sometimes, Jughead wishes his mom was more like Mrs Cooper. Tonight, he’s glad she’s not.

  
  
  
  
  


The following year, he dresses up as a vampire. It’s Archie’s costume from last year and he’s been excited about it all week until the time comes to put on the pants and he finds they’re a couple inches too short. Momentarily, he’s disappointed, until he realises that if he switches his grey socks for a pair of black ones, it’ll be much less-noticeable. 

(There’s a hole in one of the toes, and the bottom of the right one has almost no cotton left either, but he figures it’ll have to do)

His mom doesn’t have any of the white face paint Archie had last year, nor does she have the fake blood for his mouth, but Jughead doesn’t really care because when he was at the grocery store with his dad a few days ago, they’d seen some plastic fangs on a stand at the counter and - miraculously - FP had bought them.

He walks all the way to Archie’s house because he’s eight now and he’s allowed to go that far as long as he hurries and makes sure to stay on the sidewalk. Neither Archie nor Betty are allowed that far on their own (Betty isn’t even allowed to the park, and that’s only a block away from her house) so he feels rather proud about being trusted to walk without a grown-up. 

Tonight though, Mr Andrews is taking them all trick-or-treating. Mrs Andrews is making food - he hopes it’s the same hot dogs and baked potatoes from last year - and Betty said that her mom might make them a candy apple each. 

He’s the last one to arrive. Betty, dressed as Snow White, is showing Mrs Andrews her gloves. Archie and Chuck are cowboys. Reggie isn’t here because his family are on vacation and he says there’s more candy in Florida anyway. 

Jughead grins at everyone, baring his plastic fangs which are beginning to cut into his gums a little, and announces, “I’m a vampire.”

Everyone turns to look but then Chuck says, “That’s Archie’s last year’s costume,” and proceeds to fire his plastic gun at Jughead’s head. 

He’s immediately disappointed and takes the fangs from his mouth. 

“I think you look scarier than Archie did,” Betty whispers to him when Mr and Mrs Andrews leave the room, and he’s surprised at how quickly he feels better. “Did your mom make the candy apples?”

This time, it’s Betty’s turn to be disappointed. “She said they’d rot our teeth and we’d be getting lots of candy tonight anyway.”

“Oh,” he considers. “Never mind.”

She sets her lips into a line as though she’s thinking, and then tells him, “When I’m old enough to use the stove, I’ll make us all the candy apples we can eat.”

“Promise?” he asks.

Her mouth curves upwards and she extends her pinky which he links with his. “Promise.”

  
  
  
  


They go trick-or-treating together for the final time when they’re ten. It’s their last year before junior high, where, they’ve come to realise, people don’t wear costumes to beg for candy. It’s a shame, Jughead thinks. He’s come to regard this time of year as his favourite - granted, it’s mainly for the supply of candy which lasts him through November if he’s disciplined enough, but it’s also pretty nice spending time with Betty without people like Cheryl and Josie and Reggie (he only hangs out with Chuck now) making fun of them.

His costume - the solar system - is handmade. He’s spent the past week at the little coffee table between the couch and the tv with Toni Topaz, creating tiny versions of the planets which are stuck on a little haphazardly with some craft glue he found in Jellybean’s old room. It had made him sad for a while - thinking of all the cards she never got to make in their trailer - and he’s still wondering if his mom buys her some in Toledo so she can cut and stick to her heart’s content. He’s pretty proud of the costume though, messy as it is. 

He’s proud all the way from Sunnyside to Elm Street (even when Reggie calls him a dork and Chuck sniggers cruelly) and he’s prouder still when Betty gasps, crying,

“Juggie! It’s so good!”

“Thanks,” he says. “I like your costume too, Nancy Drew.”

She beams at the acknowledgement and there’s a slight pang in his chest when he realises that this is the last time they’ll do this: see each other in costumes they’ve been excited to wear for weeks. 

Archie, not completely invested in Halloween this year, is in his football uniform, which Jughead isn’t entirely sure can be classed as a costume. They’re allowed around the neighbourhood without a grown-up this year (just the two blocks surrounding Elm Street - Mrs Cooper is still very strict) and without Mr Andrews to remind them of their manners, they each take more candy that is strictly polite. 

He figures though, if it’s their last year, they might as well make the most of it. 

  
  
  
  
  


Other than the carving of a pumpkin or two, Halloween isn’t much of an event during middle school. When they all move on to Riverdale High though, the celebrations begin again, but with an edge. There are parties and ‘fright nights’ and with Archie’s dad a little preoccupied now that his mom has left, they can watch R-rated horror movies with take out from Pop’s.

They’re in sophomore year when Betty gets drunk at Cheryl Blossom’s _ Fright Night  _ party (which Jughead hasn’t been officially invited to, but Betty had insisted he accompany her and Archie to Thornhill and it’s not like he has anything else to do on a Friday night). There’s punch and he has no idea if it started out with alcohol in it or if it got spiked at some point during the night, but she’s had a cup pretty much attached to her hand all evening and is now leaning against him. She’s soft and warm and smells of something so good he doesn’t even know if there’s a name for it.

She’s dressed as Daisy Buchanan and is positively stunning, but apparently Halloween costumes for high school girls aren’t meant to have quite so much material. She’s got it wrong (he has too, but nobody pays much attention to him so it’s not quite so obvious) but he’s been sure to remind her several times that she’s the classiest one there.

“Thank you Jug,” she says, looking across the room at Archie while she squeezes his arm fondly. He watches her take another sip of punch, contemplates asking if she might want to slow down, and then decides against it. 

There’s a scream from down the hall signalling the start of the murder mystery, and Betty rights herself again. 

“You look beautiful,” he says into his drink.

She doesn’t hear.

Later, he helps Archie take her home and then watches as she strokes his face, whispering “Night Arch,” when he smooths back her hair. It hurts a little in his chest and he decides that he likes Betty Cooper a little (okay, a lot) more than he’d let himself believe. Archie sneaks out of the window and down the ladder first, and then - just as he’s sliding his leg through the space - he hears her say,

“Night Jug.”

_ Goodnight Betts,  _ he wants to say. 

He nods instead and then slides the window closed behind him.

  
  
  
  
  


Veronica Lodge throws her first Halloween party two weeks after she arrives in Riverdale. Jughead is not invited - because of course he’s not - but he hears all about it in the corridors at school and then again in the relatively safe confines of the Blue and Gold office. 

“Do you have your costume yet?” he asks Betty, not so much feigning interest (because he _ does _ want to know what she’s chosen to dress as) but forcing the questions out through figurative gritted teeth.

“I’m not sure,” she muses, tapping the end of the pen against her bottom lip. It’s wildly distracting (almost as distracting as when she does that thing where she bites it) and he wants to rub his thumb over the little delve it’s making.

He doesn’t.

“Isn’t it  _ the party of the decade  _ or something?”

“Exactly,” she says. “I have to get it right.”

He thinks back to all the Halloweens in which he  _ hasn’t _ got it right, and feels a rush of something in his chest that he chooses not to define. 

“I was thinking maybe Sandy from Grease.” 

Jughead casts his mind back to that awful,  _ awful  _ time when he agreed to watch said movie with an awed Betty, and decides she’d be the perfect 50’s skirt-wearing Sandy Olsson. (Except, of course, it wasn’t really awful at all, because they’d been sitting on the couch so close together that she’d bumped her arm against his every time she’d gotten excited)

He nods. “Good choice.”

A week later, on the night of Veronica’s party, Jughead takes up his usual spot in Pop’s in the booth farthest from the door with his laptop on the table and a coffee cup in his hand. Pop brings his burger with extra fries and a basket of onion rings despite the fact that he’s already eaten a frozen tv dinner, and he settles in to write.

He doesn’t notice the passing time, nor does he register the doorbell chime or Betty approach his table until he hears the delicate sound of her clearing her throat. That’s when he looks up and his mouth runs dry.

“Hey Juggie,” she says, and his eyes travel the length of her body. She’s dressed as Sandy, but not the Sandy he’d imagined. Leather pants are molded to her legs and he can see the curve of her breasts peeking out from the tight black top they’re paired with. She’s stunning.

“Uh…” Jughead stutters. “Hi. W- what are you doing here?”

She shrugs but her eyes look sad and he closes his laptop, expecting her to sit across the table. Instead, she slides into the booth beside him and steals one of the now-cold onion rings from the handful left in the basket. 

“Betts?”

“Archie and Veronica,” she replies, and his heart sinks.

So the weeks of flirting must’ve finally culminated in a kiss, he decides. Or more. (Probably more) “Right.”

She takes a big breath and then sighs it out. Pop brings her coffee and she smiles gratefully, and Jughead wants to tell her he knows exactly how she’s feeling, but of course, he doesn’t.

“What’re you working on?” she asks, nodding towards the laptop.

“The Jingle Jangle article.”

“On a Friday night?”

He shrugs. “News doesn’t sleep just because we do, Betty.”

That makes her laugh - a real laugh that crinkles her eyes at the corners - and his heart soars. She steals another onion ring and he moves the basket closer to her. “Can I read it so far?”

When he slides the laptop along the table, he sees the goosebumps on her arms. He takes off his jacket - it’s not like he’s cold - and sets it over her shoulders. Absently, she fingers the leather as she reads and then, when she reaches the end, seems to realise what he’s done.

Betty tugs the jacket a little further around her body and then says, “Thanks Juggie,” before resting her head on his shoulder. He shuts the laptop and decides writing can wait until later.

“They’re showing Friday the 13th at the Bijou. We could catch the late showing - it’s still your favourite, right?”

She lifts her head momentarily to look at him. “I wouldn’t mind just staying here, with you,” she tells him. “If that’s okay?”

He wants to kiss her forehead, but he doesn’t. “It’s okay.”

  
  
  
  
  


Miraculously, despite the odds being stacked against him, Jughead makes it out of Riverdale to college. And not just any college. He makes it to Kings College, London. 

It had been Betty’s suggestion; Betty’s help with the application; Betty’s number he’d called when the acceptance letter had arrived in the post with the Queen’s head on a stamp.

“I don’t know if I can open it,” he’d told her, staring at the envelope with the realisation that he might want to study in England more than he’d let himself believe.

He’d have been devastated, he knows, if it had begun with ‘we regret to inform you’. And not just because it would’ve meant staying in Riverdale, but because it would’ve meant staying in Riverdale while Betty was attending lectures and seminars in London for the very same course he’d applied for. 

But, perhaps in a twist of fate that feels like it should be a part of someone else’s life, they go together.

Not  _ together _ together, but still. 

The weather isn’t quite as crisp in England as it is in upstate New York at this time of year, but the tree-lined streets are punctuated with russet and gold and amber and Jughead thinks that October might just be his favourite. 

Betty, however, is cross. She’s cross that none of the three Starbucks near campus do pumpkin spice lattes like the ones back in America, and she’s cross that she can’t get canned pumpkin in the local Sainsbury’s, and she’s cross too, that Halloween in England isn’t quite the same level of over-the-top that they’re used to.

He meets her at the edge of Regent’s Park and they take a walk towards the boating lake, kicking through rivers of crisp leaves as they go. 

“I think we should go to the party Jug,” she tells him before sipping at her vanilla hot chocolate (the next best thing, she keeps telling him, to the pumpkin latte she so badly craves)

“Because?”

“Because we don’t want to be social recluses.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Jughead counters. “That’s  _ exactly _ what I want to be.”

“Okay, then _ I _ don’t want to be a social recluse. We have to keep our fingers on the pulse - what if we need sources of information?”

“About the freshers’ Halloween Party?”

She gives him a little shove - one that’s not meant to cause harm - but because he’s him and he’s with her and he’s not exactly fully concentrating, he trips over, nearly tumbling into the lake. Betty’s quick to save him, grabbing his arm before he can fall in and get soaked, but she laughs at his expense and he wonders what it’s like to be someone who’s in full control of their limbs at all times.

As a reward though, Betty links her arm with his and they walk together as she sips her hot chocolate and he drinks his americano and the breeze picks up a collection of leaves so they dance around their feet. 

“Fine,” he grumbles. “As long as I don’t have to dress up.”

She giggles and his chest feels light as she says, “Juggie, that’s the whole point.”

“Then I refuse to shop for a costume.”

“Okay,” she shrugs. “I’ll get you something.”

“Nothing ironic,” he instructs. “Or iconic for that matter. Just something that’ll let me blend into the background.”

(He’ll wear whatever she brings him though, he already knows. Still, he might as well at least  _ appear  _ convincing)

The party, located in a cold gymnasium-style ‘hall’ with peeling paint and a deathtrap wood floor, is well underway when he arrives. Betty is meeting him at the event after participating in what her student halls call the  _ prelash _ \- some sort of British culture staple in which everyone is supposed to get drunk to the point of being almost unable to see and walk before leaving the shared kitchen/living space - and he really hopes he hasn’t arrived before her.

Luckily for Jughead, he spots her not too long after he’s arrived, chatting to someone he recognises as being on their journalism course. The prelash doesn’t seem to have done her any harm - she is, from where he’s standing, seemingly able to walk without incident - and by the time he reaches her, his Vincent Vega costume makes sense. 

“Mia,” he says by way of greeting, and her whole face lights up when she smiles at him. 

“Juggie, you look so good!”

“Vincent,” he corrects, faux-combing his hair as if he really does have the swagger to pull it off, and Betty giggles, wrapping her arms around him in a hug. 

She is, he realises at this point, a little tipsy, and he steadies her when she wobbles closer against him. “I hope you’re not expecting me to dance?”

“We’ll see,” she replies, and he keeps his hand on the small of her back when she finally peels herself off of him.

A couple hours later, after they’ve watched a number of people vomit before reaching the bathroom, Betty suggests they leave. Jughead has absolutely no objections, and she takes his hand as they step out into the cold air. It’s a new development: she’ll loop her arm in his often, but their fingers have never been linked like this before. It makes him feel a little giddy.

It makes him want desperately to kiss her.

They catch the tube to London Bridge and then walk the short distance to Betty’s accommodation. Jughead always feels uneasy about the thought of her walking alone here, and must involuntarily tighten his grip because she asks,

“Is something wrong?”

“No,” he says. (Yes, he thinks)

_ “Jug.” _ It’s her way of telling him she doesn’t believe him, and he’s not quite sure how to tell her he loves her. “There’s something you’re not saying.”

Even after that goddamn prelash she can figure him out.

“What is it?”

“It’s…” he starts, but then bails, sighing inwardly as they turn right onto Weston Street. “It’s nothing, Betts.”

(Except, it’s everything.  _ She’s  _ everything)

They reach the front door of Wolfson House and this time, it’s Betty who sighs - outwardly too. The moon is spilling silvery light over her face, and as she turns towards him, she drops his hand. Suddenly, it’s all the impetus he needs to take his chance, and the way he says her name is desperate in its tone.

“Betty -” 

He kisses her: a gentle press of his lips against hers; hands framing either side of her face so his thumbs can feel how soft her cheeks are, and everything he’s felt for her these past fifteen years they’ve been friends feels like it’s about to bubble over if he doesn’t press pause.

And so he does.

Betty’s eyes stay closed even as she pulls away, her fingers reaching absently to touch her lips. He waits for her reaction; for her to run upstairs, not call him, sit awkwardly beside him in their Monday morning lecture. 

“Jug,” she whispers, and leans in to kiss him again. It’s short - shorter than he’d like - but it’s followed by, “Do you want to come inside? I made candy apples.”

  
  
  
  


“Look!” Betty says excitedly, pointing towards the window of one of the many Starbucks near Covent Garden. There are Halloween-themed stickers in the window. “You think they have pumpkin spice lattes this year?”

Before Jughead can answer, she’s tugging him by the hand - their fingers still linked - until he’s being hit by warm air and that beautiful scent of freshly-ground coffee.

“Hi!” she says brightly to the unmoved barista. “Do you guys have pumpkin spice lattes?”

“No,” she says. “We have the regular ones. Or a flat white. You can add a shot of syrup like caramel or…” and Jughead can tell his girlfriend isn’t really listening to the rest. 

“I guess I’ll just have a vanilla hot chocolate then,” she says, clearly disappointed. He decides he’ll do some research tonight - see if he can find anywhere in the city that’ll make her the drink she wants. 

“Is that everything?” the barista asks, and Jughead adds his order of a tall americano and then pays for both despite Betty’s protests that she’s got it. She shoots him a look that he knows means  _ you don’t have to buy mine,  _ and he sends her one back that means _ I’ll never let you win this fight. _

They meander slowly around the streets, through the market hall and towards the Royal Opera House because it’s her favourite building, and Betty tucks herself closer against him in shelter from the cold. He squeezes gently with his arm, and after a moment of quiet, she asks,

“Do you think this city will  _ ever  _ accept pumpkin spice lattes as being a thing?”

“I don’t know baby,” he replies, dropping a kiss to hair. “They  _ are _ pretty gross.”

Jughead’s search that evening proves unsuccessful, as do the further searches he makes on subsequent evenings. By the time October 31st arrives, Betty has had to make do with pumpkin carving - using the innards for a particularly tasty soup - and neither of them are willing to spend the evening doing anything other than eating candy and watching horror movies. 

He arrives at her place, passing her three housemates who’re on their way to prelash, and is greeted by the wonderful smell of candy apples. 

“Hey Jug,” she smiles, turning her attention from the washing up so she can kiss him. 

“A pumpkin sweater?” he asks on a laugh, fingering the soft black material patterned with orange. “Really?”

“It’s festive,” she counters. “And cute.”

He pretends to consider her comment for a moment but that stupid grin he wears whenever she’s around gives him away. “I guess you’re right.”

“You  _ know  _ I’m right,” Betty reminds him, stepping closer and tilting her chin so he’ll kiss her again - which, of course, he does.

Later, they snuggle into her single bed, blankets pulled up to their chests, and eat their way through four candy apples (Betty: one and a half; him: two and the remaining half) as they watch Scream. She falls asleep part-way through the Japanese version of The Ring and so he watches the rest of it on mute so as not to wake her. 

  
  
  
  
  


Jughead is on his way home from work when he sees the poster. It’s bright orange and edged with a pattern of dark brown leaves, and there, in large letters are the words: Pumpkin Spice Latte. 

Something in his chest does a little skip - he figures it must be excitement on his fiance’s behalf - and he enters into the coffee shop feeling somewhat proud of himself. 

“Can I get a pumpkin spice latte?” he asks the barista. 

“Tall?” he assumes, but Jughead shakes his head.

“Venti, please.” he gets the whipped cream too because his girl should have all the trimmings, and then he half-runs the final leg of his walk home so Betty can get the coffee before it goes cold.

Thankfully, she’s already home before him, stirring something at the stovetop which smells like homemade tomato sauce.

“Close your eyes,” he instructs with a grin, and then watches as she turns down the heat first before complying.

He curves his arm around her side, holding the cardboard cup out so it’ll be the first thing she sees when she opens her eyes, and then drops a kiss to her shoulder. “Okay,” he murmurs against her skin. “Open.”

She gasps and spins so quickly that he almost tips the coffee out, but he rights himself just in time for her to kiss him.

“I love you,” Betty smiles, kissing him for a second time before taking the cup. “And you got me a big one!” 

“You waited five years for this drink,” he laughs. “You think I’d get you a small?”

She takes off the lid and licks the cream, closing her eyes as she swallows, and then takes a big gulp. Immediately though, her nose scrunches and she pulls away.

“What is it?” Jughead asks. “Is the milk bad?”

“It’s,” she starts, considering for a moment before quickly setting the cup on the counter. “I think I’m going to throw up.”

He watches, slightly bewildered, as she flees to the bathroom. 

(And then, two weeks later, a test confirms she’s pregnant)

  
  
  
  
  


“Oh my gosh Juliet!” Jughead hears from their fake-cobwebbed hallway. “Your house looks awesome!”

_ You’d have a field day in America kid,  _ he thinks, and takes up his position by the dining room door, which his daughter has designated as ‘the scaring position’. 

He jumps out theatrically as Juliet’s first guest enters, and makes the boy dressed as Dracula scream awfully loudly before dissolving into a fit of giggles. Betty gets them sorted with juice as they await the other three guests - friends from her class at school - and Jughead wipes the smudge of fake blood off of the door. 

The kids wolf their way through Betty’s Halloween buffet and he feels a sense of mild panic that there won’t be any left for him, and as if she can tell, his wife rubs his back while murmuring in his ear, “I saved you some - it’s in the kitchen.”

“I love you,” he tells her before hurrying off for his ‘bleeding finger’ sandwiches and ‘worm spaghetti’, and even though he’s already out of the room, he can tell she’s smiling.

An hour later, Jughead feels a level of empathy he’s never felt before. And it’s for Fred Andrews and his years of trick-or-treating. 

Guiding five four-year-olds hopped up on sugar and excitement to walk the street in an orderly manner is way harder than he’d considered it might be. His own daughter, he thinks, might be the worst - bouncing on her tiptoes each time she spots a house with a lit pumpkin outside.

“Come on daddy!” she calls in that British accent he’s been powerless to keep her from getting. “You’re too slow!”

He speeds up only slightly because Betty keeps reminding him that he needs to be stricter with her (which he thinks is a rather unfair thing to ask given that Juliet is literally  _ everything _ Betty, but in miniature) and they ring the doorbell when all six of them are pressed together on the top step. 

“Oh my goodness!” the woman who answers the door exclaims. “Look at you all!”

“Trick or treat!” the kids shout, and Jughead raises his eyebrows with a wry smile. 

“You’ve gone all out,” the woman muses as the kids delve into the offered tub of candy, and Jughead smiles, thinking,  _ this is nothing: you clearly haven’t met Betty Cooper-Jones.  _

They make it home before eight-thirty, with the kids all beginning to flag, and Betty greets each of them enthusiastically at the front door. Juliet’s friends’ parents arrive not long after, and they each go home with a candy apple tied with an orange ribbon. 

“Is there one for me?” he asks Betty once she’s shut the door, stroking her protruding stomach gently. “Or did you two eat the spares?”

She tsks gently, but she’s smiling as their son kicks against his hand and he soothes the stretched skin beneath her shirt. It’s a short moment - interrupted by the sound of candy being unwrapped in the living room, and Betty heads in to remind their child that she’s already had enough. 

Jughead busies himself with unloading and the restacking the dishwasher, tidying away the final few dishes from the party, and then joins his wife in the bathroom to help scrub off Juliet’s face paint. 

Once she’s asleep and he’s showered too, Betty brings him his own candy apple which, rather than the orange glittery sugar the kids’ treats had been decorated with, is covered in a variety of his favourite toppings. 

“I can eat it in bed?” he questions, eyeing the chopped pretzels and then the white sheets, and Betty nods as she smooths down his pillow.

“I think you earned it.”

They take it in turns for a bite, and when a few M&Ms fall onto the mattress between them, she quickly shoves them in her mouth before he gets the chance.

“Hey! I thought I earned this?”

“Your son’s hungry too,” she answers, and he loses at that, because she’s growing his child at which he’ll never not be in awe. Jughead rubs his hand over her stomach, wondering silently what costumes Betty will create for him when he’s here.

“You finish it,” he says, and hands her the remainder of the apple. When he kisses her later, he can taste the sweetness on her lips, and he smiles. “You can have pumpkin spice again next year.”

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are HUGELY appreciated  
> Find me on Tumblr at @itsindiansummer13


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